


What Are You Hiding?

by bucky77



Category: Doctor Who & Related Fandoms, Doctor Who (2005), Torchwood
Genre: Alcohol, First Kiss, Fluff, Fluff and Humor, Friendship, Humor, Life in the TARDIS, M/M, Meddling TARDIS, TARDIS - Freeform
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-12-27
Updated: 2019-12-27
Packaged: 2021-02-25 22:34:33
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,534
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21993025
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/bucky77/pseuds/bucky77
Summary: Rose catches the Doctor in the middle of disposing of the evidence...
Relationships: The Doctor/Jack Harkness
Kudos: 30





	What Are You Hiding?

**Author's Note:**

> Prompt: What are you hiding?

The Doctor thumbed through the security tapes from the previous night, desperately trying to locate the right one. The sheer size of the TARDIS meant the volume of tapes she produced was ridiculous, and after half an hour of searching he still hadn’t found it.

The Doctor didn’t drink. Never. He liked to pretend it was because the taste was gross and Time Lords couldn’t get drunk, so it was pointless anyway, but that was bullshit. Time Lords could get drunk, very drunk very quickly. Last night, Rose had turned in early and Jack and the Doctor had stayed up, talking and drinking in the library. It was only when the Doctor was already pleasantly tipsy that he realised the drinks were alcoholic, and by that time his inhibitions had been lowered enough to forget why drinking any more would be a bad idea. 

Mixing Jack with alcohol had the exact effect you would expect it to have: he becomes more of a flirt than anyone could ever think possible. And after a couple drinks, the Doctor started to forget why he always pushed him away…

“Aha!” The Doctor yelled as he found the tape for the last 24 hours in the library. He had put the TARDIS into orbit around a supernova and had every intention of throwing the tape into it and never looking back. He walked out of the security cupboard’s door straight into the console room, still reading the label on the tape, when he heard a set of light footsteps walk up the stairs. In a desperate last ditch attempt to hide what he was doing, the Doctor whipped his hands behind his back so they couldn’t see what he was holding. He looked up to see Rose, who had stopped in her tracks and was looking at him suspiciously.

“What are you hiding?” She asked, amused. 

“Nothing,” the Doctor shook his head, feigning innocence despite the fact he knew there was no way in hell she’d believe him for a second. A smile broke out over her face, like a child who’d just discovered a new game. The Doctor could feel his pulse quicken as he realised just how totally screwed he actually was. She took a few steps towards him, and he mirrored her actions, stepping away. He tried desperately to tell her with her eyes to drop it, that this wasn’t a joke, but his efforts failed miserably as she either didn’t notice or didn’t care. She managed to back him up against the wall, and he quickly tucked the tape into the back of his pants, raising his hands in a playful surrender and forcing an innocent smile onto his face.

Rose walked so close to him that their bodies were nearly pressed up against each other, and she reached out to feel behind him. He batted away one of her hands just in time for the other to snake around him and feel the tape. She grabbed it and tried to read the writing on it, but the TARDIS wrote in Gallifreyan, and didn’t translate it. This seemed to fuel Rose’s curiosity further.

“What is it?” She asked.

“It’s nothing,” he tried, trying to snatch it from her hands, but she was just as quick as him. She ran out of his reach to the other side of the console, trying to figure out what to do with it.

“Is it a tape?” She asked, looking up at him, grinning when he accidentally answered her question with his silence. She moved around to the monitor and found the slot to insert the tape suspiciously fast. Her eyes glinted at him like a playful and before he could run to stop her she had slipped it in.

The Doctor cursed under his breath and ran to her side, frantically pressing buttons to try and eject the tape before it played, but it seemed the TARDIS had sided with Rose on the matter and refused to let him have his way. On screen, an image of the library, relatively dark and grainy but still clear enough, appeared. The Doctor could see himself, sitting next to Jack on the couch, their lips moving slightly as they joked with each other.

“Rose, dammit,” the Doctor tried in vain to get her to give up, but her eyes were firmly fixed on the screen. He entwined his fingers with hers, moving to lead her away, but she didn’t let him. Finally, the Doctor took a step back, watching the screen over her shoulder, resigning himself to his fate. 

Jack and himself threw their heads back laughing on the screen. Jack spoke to the Doctor, head tilting in the tell-tale fashion he always used when he was flirting with someone. He knew it, and Rose knew it (she’d been on the receiving end more than a few times). She smiled at the familiar action, still thinking it was a joke. 

“Is there sound on this thing?” She asked, and a second later Jack’s voice flooded the console room. The Doctor was flung into a new panic as he realised there was no volume knob.

“Are you fucking kidding me?” He yelled at the TARDIS, eliciting a hearty laugh from Rose.

“Why don’t you come over here and prove it?” Jack flirted with the Doctor.

“You’d have no clue what to do with yourself if I started taking you seriously,” he replied.

“Oh I think I’d handle myself.”

“Mmm, really?” The Doctor leant slightly forward, slinging his arm over the back of the couch and staring intently at Jack, an unspoken challenge. Rose had fallen silent, having never seen this side of the Doctor before. The Doctor took another drink, not taking his eyes off Jack. Behind Rose, the Doctor rubbed his hands over his face and groaned in embarrassment. Rose ignored him. 

By the time the Doctor looked back at the screen, Jack had shifted slightly closer to his past self, and was returning his intense stare.

“Are you telling me you’re taking me seriously?” Jack asked, exuding confidence. The Doctor raised his eyebrows suggestively, trying to catch Jack out. It worked, as Jack’s cocky smile faltered, and Rose let out a breathy chuckle. “Are you telling me if I tried to kiss you right now you’d let me?” Jack joked, recovering his previous confidence. It was clear in his tone there was nothing about this situation he believed.

“Why don’t you come find out?” The Doctor quipped, a statement which Rose seemed to find unendingly hilarious. Jack hesitated for a second before seemingly deciding it was worth a try and scooting much closer to the Doctor. Their eyes were still locked, neither of them daring to back down. Jack paused again, testing whether the Doctor was showing any hesitation. He wasn’t, he didn’t so much as flinch. Deep in thought, Jack caught his bottom lip between his teeth and narrowed his eyes at the man in front of him. The Doctor tilted his head at him, a wordless question. Slowly, Jack leant in, closing the gap between them inch by inch.

“Rose, come on this isn’t funny,” the Doctor made a final attempt at pulling her away from the screen.

“You didn’t,” she looked back at him still not quite believing he didn’t pull away, then, seeing the genuine embarrassment in his face, whipped her eyes back to the screen in time for Jack to press his lips against the Doctor’s. “You did!” Rose screeched, finally letting the Doctor pull her far enough away from the screen for him to force the tape out of the monitor. Immediately he stormed over to the doors of the TARDIS and flung the tape into the abyss, never to be seen again. All the while Rose watched him, grinning from ear to ear. He met her eye again and narrowed them, trying to appear threatening.

“Do not,” he warned her.

“Does he remember that?” She asked, trying to gage how much damage had actually been done.

“Probably not,” the Doctor replied. “I haven’t seen him. And you will not say a word,” he added when he saw the cheeky look in her eye. They watched each other in silence for a minute, testing each other’s boundaries. The Doctor wasn’t sure if Rose would back down and forget about it, or whether he’d never hear the end of it. It could’ve gone either way.

“Okay,” she finally conceded. The Doctor breathed a sigh of relief, nodding his thanks, as he went to move the TARDIS away from the supernova. “Why’d you do it?” She asked him.

“Don’t get any ideas,” he groaned, knowing exactly what this looked like. He was in no way in love with Jack, and didn’t want that to be the rumour that started bouncing around in Rose’s head.

“Was it good?” She teased him. He snapped his head up to glare at her with the full force of the Oncoming Storm, and she just giggled innocently. She strolled casually past him on the way out of the console room, patting him comically on the shoulder and she passed. “Ah, my Doctor. After all this time, still full of surprises.”

**Author's Note:**

> I don't own these characters. Comments and criticism always welcome!


End file.
